Letting Go
by TinyTut83
Summary: Liara finds comfort in the arms of her commander after the loss of her mother. Not canon with my other works. One shot. Written for a prompt on the kink meme.


Bioware owns all.

This does not fit into the canon of my other works. I wrote this as a h/c fill over on the kinkmeme and figured I would share it on here too. I wrote this in about 2 hours, on my cell phone.

**Tut**

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><p>Shepard walked the empty passageways of the Normandy, her mind replaying the events of the past few days. She found herself questioning her own resolve, something she would never do in front of the crew, but something she found herself doing more and more in these private moments.<p>

The mission to Therum had been the first real test of her new crew. Not overly complicated, but challenging enough to forge her and her fellow soldiers into a single unit through the fires of combat. Therum also introduced her to the lovely Dr. T'Soni. The asari archeologist had slowly been occupying more and more of her thoughts. The young maiden was shaken after her ordeal, but she seemed to recover quickly. Strong and resilient, she offered to help the commander track down her own mother and make her answer for her actions.

Following Therum was Feros. Another true test of her teams combat skills as they battled Geth, creepers, asari clones and even fellow humans turned mad. The freed asari had transferred the cipher to the alliance officer, an experience that was both overwhelming and highly intimate. Again, her thoughts turned her young asari crew member.

Fighting against clones of someone who was once your mentor and friend had to be rough, but Liara took it in stride, or so the commander thought. Shepard had seen the look on the doctor's face when Fai Dan had pulled the trigger ending his own life. It's hard to watch someone die in combat, but to watch a civilian end his own life had even made the harden N7 soldier pause.

Sighing, Shepard shook the thoughts from her head as she found herself in the mess hall. Even though it was empty, and long past midnight, like on naval ships of old, there was always a pot of coffee ready. She poured the bitter brew into a mug and sat and a table.

Looking at the closed Med-bay doors she again reflected on the woman sleeping in the back room. If Therum had shaken her then Feros had chipped away at her innocent nature. Liara had become slightly more withdrawn, maybe even harder if one were to look closely. But she was still the sweet innocent scientist they had rescued, always looking for the good. But then came Noveria...

Of course from the first moment that they had stepped foot on the god forsaken frozen planet Shepard had a bad feeling. When it was confirmed that Benezia was there she knew why. By the time Shepard, Liara and Tali had cleared the hot labs and found themselves face to face with the matriarch Shepard was kicking herself for not sending the maiden back to the ship. The way Liara's voice cracked as she addressed her mother, or the look of pain in her eyes when her mother sent wave after wave of commandos at the three made the human's heart break.

Knowing that the elder asari was not in her right mind made delivering that final shot even more painful, but Shepard knew she had to be the one to pull the trigger. She could not let Liara live with the knowledge that she had killer her own mother, the woman who brought her into this world.  
>Hours after returning to the ship, Shepard had tried to talk to Liara about the events of the day, but Liara insisted that she way fine. It was bullshit, and the commander knew it, but before she could press the issues the Council had sent them to Virmire. What a cluster fuck that turned out to be.<br>Losing Kaiden had been hard on the entire crew. Of course Ashley was the most vocal about it, but when Liara had melded with the commander during the debrief, Shepard had felt the sadness and grief in the asari's soul.

Now, as the Normandy made its way back to the Citedal, Shepard knew she had to do something to shake the young asari from her grief. There were battles to be fought and won, and she needed everyone at their best. But the archeologist was not a trained soldier or mercenary, she did not know how to just bury the pain, bury the grief, and save it for another time. That was a skill learned through years of battle, years of loss.

Sighing again the commander downed the rest of the luke warm, stale, coffee and stood. Pulling her tunic in place she made her way into the med-bay and walked slowly towards the door to the lab. The light flowing from the beneath the door indicated that the occupant was still awake, despite the late hour. Not wanting to give Liara the chance to avoid her, Shepard typed in the override code on the door panel and stepped into the room.

Liara was seated with her back to the door, as always. In her hand was a data pad containing a picture of her mother. That alone broke the human's heart. Upon hearing the door open the asari quickly stood, fresh tears evident on her face.

"Liara..." Shepard started to say, but her mind was blank.

"Shepard, what can I do for you?" Liara asked, scrubbing her cheeks with her hand, praying the commander had not seen the tears. "Have we reached the Citadel already?"

"No. I saw your light was on so I thought I would come by and see how you were doing," Shepard internally cursed the timid tone of her voice.

"I am fine commander, as I stated before."

"Come on Liara," Shepard said as she stepped closer, "that's a load of crap and you know it. It the past few weeks you have been attacked by the geth, forced into battle, questioned by my crew and four days ago you were forced to battle against your own mother and watch her die."

Stepping up the the desk, the commander pointed to the data pad, "It's well after lights out and I find you here crying alone over a picture of your mother. You are not fine Liara."

Shepard instantly regretted her words as a pained and embarrassed look flashed through the blue eyes of the woman in front of her.

*Damn it, this is not coming out right.* She thought to herself.

"Shepard, I assure you, my personal emotions will not interfere with the mission in any way. I will be ready for whatever the next challenge is." Liara said, her voice void of all emotions. Taking a few steps back to distance herself from her commander she held her hands behind her back and tried to keep her gaze steady. "You need not worry about me Commander."

Running her hand through her hair in frustration, Shepard leaned against the edge of the desk and looked at the floor to collect her thoughts. Dealing with emotions was not one of the officer's strong points. If something made her sad, she shot it. If someone pissed her off, she punched them.

Time to lay her cards out there.

"Liara, look. I am worried about you, I want to be worried about you. I'm not here to reprimand you, or make sure you are mission ready. I trust you, I know when the time comes you will be at my side facing down whatever enemy we find," she looked back up, her green eyes locking with the blue eyes of her young friend.

"But right now, I'm not here as your CO, I'm here as a friend. And as a friend I'm asking you to let me help you," with that said, Shepard opened her arms, her eyes begging Liara to come closer, to let her be that shoulder she needed to cry on.

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><p>Standing there she could feel the knot in her chest tighten its hold as the human woman held her arms out. By the Goddess as she wanted to do was run into those arms, bury her head in the soft hair, inhale that warm spicy sent that belonged only to Shepard, and let the tears flow.<p>

But something stopped her.

That nagging voice at the back of her mind was telling her to be strong, to fight back the tears. *If you break down and cry, how do you expect her to ever see you as more than a child? Do you honestly think someone as strong and brave as the commander would ever take such a weak youngling as a mate?* The doubts ran through her mind.

It was true that they had both confessed their mutual attraction to each other, but they had agreed to give it time, to put the mission first. She had dreamed about feeling Shepard's arms wrapped around her, she had wondered what it would be like to run her fingers through the dark hair, so foreign looking, yet so beautiful.

Here was her chance.

Shepard was offering to share her pain, to be her pillar of support in her time of need, it would that ruin any future hopes of a relationship? Liara's mind was spinning.

"Liara, please..." the soft plea broke her out of her thoughts.

Looking into the human's eyes she could see nothing but love, mix with a bit of sorrow. That look broke her resolve and she took the three steps forward and buried her face in the neck of her commander. Her arms wrapped around the human's thin waist as she felt two arms wrap themselves around her own form.

"That's it," Shepard said softly, her hands tracing soothing patterns on the asari's back, "just let it go."

And with those words, the tears came. Her body was shaken with sobs as the tears fell. The maiden cried for her fallen mother, a woman who had tried to turn the path of evil, only to be over run by it. She cried for Kaidan, the young biotic that had shown her friendship during their brief time together. She cried for Shiala, knowing the matron would suffer for years from the effects of the indoctrination and the control of the Thorian. And she cried for herself, she was alone now. Losing one parent to the great unknown and one to the goddess.

As she clung to the woman that was her support, she felt the knot in her chest begin to loosen. She felt the pain in her heart begin to slowly fade, and she felt the weariness in her mind dissipate. For the first time since the geth had appeared on Therum, Liara felt safe. Safe in the arms of her commander.

Safe in the arms of her friend.

End.


End file.
